A Gun Control Law That Would Actually Work
By Robert Wright
Dec 17 2012, 10:03 AM ET Comment

The AR-15 is getting its fifteen minutes of fame. Whole articles in major newspapers are devoted to the rifle that Adam Lanza used in the Newtown shooting, as the nation begins to debate restoring the ban on "assault weapons."

But the assault weapons issue is a red herring.

First of all, there's no clear and simple definition of an assault weapon, and this fact has in the past led to incoherent regulation. The defunct 1994 assault weapons ban, according to the Wall Street Journal, outlawed "semiautomatic rifles that accepted detachable magazines and possessed at least two other characteristics, including a protruding pistol grip, flash suppressor or threaded barrel or a folding or telescoping stock." Um, how important was it whether the gun Lanza used had a "flash suppressor"? And, by sacrificing that and a few other such features ("protruding pistol grip," etc.), a mass killer gets to keep his detachable magazine, for rapid reloading?

Second, focusing on assault weapons--or even rifles in general--distracts from the important issue of magazine capacity in pistols. It's true that if you had taken away Lanza's AR-15, he wouldn't have had a rifle that could fire 30 rounds without reloading. However, he was also carrying two pistols--a Glock 20 and a Sig Sauer P226--each of which can fire 15 rounds without reloading. And, actually, since two pistols are less conspicuous than a rifle, they're a more effective way to get 30 rounds of continuous fire into lots of public settings.

Imagine the following world, which it's within our power to create: It's illegal to sell or possess a firearm--rifle or pistol--that can hold more than six bullets. And it's illegal to sell or possess a firearm with a detachable magazine. In other words, once a shooter exhausted the six rounds, he couldn't just snap in another six-round magazine; he'd have to put six more bullets in the gun one by one.

In this world, a significant number of those 20 Newtown first graders would almost certainly be alive. Lanza reportedly fired six bullets from his AR-15 just to get inside the locked school. So, in the alternative universe I just described, he would then have to more or less exhaust one of his two pistols to kill the principal and school psychologist he encountered after entering. At that point, as he headed for the classrooms, he'd have six more rapid-fire bullets left, after which he'd have to reload his guns bullet by bullet.

Is there a single legitimate use of firearms that requires more than six rounds of continuous fire? Certainly not hunting. And not any sort of self-defense that's realistically imaginable, unless you've recently antagonized a Mexican drug cartel.

As the gun lobby gears up to battle proposals such as this one, you'll hear a lot about the fact that mass killings are actually a drop in the bucket of total homicides. True. But mass killings take a disproportionate toll on the nation psychologically and spiritually. Thirty individual people dying in isolated assaults in various cities is a horrible thing, but it doesn't terrify our children, and it doesn't turn our schools into bunkers.

The sort of law I'm describing would make lots of current guns illegal. (I actually own one.) So you'd have to phase the law in over a couple of years, and, to overcome political resistance, you might have to compensate gun owners for surrendering newly illegal guns--or for having them altered to comply with the law. And, even then, the resistance would be very, very strong. It might even turn out to be insurmountable. But if the question is "What could we do that would greatly reduce the scale of mass killings while preserving the right of Americans to use firearms for legitimate purposes," this, it seems to me, is a real answer.

Update, 12/17 4:25 p.m.: More than one commenter has noted that most handguns currently manufactured would be illegal under my proposal. True. (As I noted in the final paragraph, I own such a gun.) And on Twitter, @drgitlin has noted something I didn't realize: A revolver, which would be clearly legal under my proposal, can be loaded fairly quickly with a "speedloader." Well, if speedloaders are indeed so speedy that they're the functional equivalent of detachable magazines, they could be banned. And as for the fact that most or all non-revolver pistols would be illegal under my proposal: You'd be surprised how fast gun manufacturers would fill this void by designing semi-automatics that could hold a maximum of six bullets and could only be loaded one bullet at a time. I'm not saying this makes my proposal politically feasible; the number of existing owners of conventional semi-automatic pistols (i.e. semi-automatics with detachable magazines) might create insurmountable resistance to it, as I noted in the final paragraph. Still, governments do have the power to ban things that exist, and in this case creating substitutes that complied with the new law would be very doable. And, even if banning detachable magazines in pistols does prove politically infeasible, that doesn't mean we can't make real progress by doing the politically easier thing of banning all magazines, for both rifles and handguns, that hold more than six bullets. And it's a trivial matter for manufacturers to create magazines that would fit existing guns and comply with that law. In any event, we shouldn't be fooled into thinking that another ban on "assault weapons" is by itself significant progress.

The key would be getting the old guns off the streets. Good luck with that.

"Guns on the streets" is almost as ****tardedly annoying as "bring 'em to justice."

If you have one street, and law abiding citizens living on it collectively own 100 firearms, which are all securely stored and have never been used in a crime (as opposed to being propped up on the curbs next to their mailboxes), I really don't see a problem with it.

However, if you have a carload of miscreant gangbangers driving down the same street in a car with four guns, actually shooting up the neighborhood because they're trying to bust a cap in Leroy's ass but Leroy ain't home and they can't hit anything anyway, that's a problem.

There are well over 300 million civilian firearms in the US. This proposed ban would make at least 80% of those illegal. Probably more. You're not going to pass anything that makes illegal over 200,000,000 of any item already in US civilian hands. Not no way, not no how. That's so completely unfeasible that discussing it is pointless. The author makes no mention of how we would actually create this fantasy gun free world he describes. And that's the giant elephant in the room. His fantasy gun free world might prevent a small amount of violent crime. But the problem is that the author just glosses over how we would get to that point.

It's nice that the author is trying and making suggestions. But we need something considerably more than just "OK, now imagine a world with no _____. Wouldn't that be great?"

Remember that I'm pro-gun when I say this: If indeed we are going to have a national conversation about guns, the rhetoric in the responses in this thread -- laughter and insults -- isn't going to endear the pro-gun stance to the many thousands of concerned & gun-ignorant people proposing gun control. You're going to need to be able to calmly and intelligently explain why this proposed measure would be ineffective.

I love how the response to this post is nothing but slander towards "moonbat liberrals who want to ban all guns"

We arent going to geT anywhere in a dire situation where we desperately need to get somewhere with if we keep insulting the other side. I dont tihnk anyone wants to see what happened in CT happen again. I think most Americans would liek to come to some solution to do everything we can to protect ourselves and our children. WE ARENT GOING TO GET THAT DONE BY TROWING INSULTS AND FALSITIES AT EACH OTHER.

the above quote is basically about having meaningful conversations about what to do next. How do we protect ourselves as well as the 2nd ammendent? Without disarming citizens and without arming children when they go to school?

I dont own a gun, but if I wanted to or needed to, Id like to be able, but I dont need a AK-47.

I work with a guy who has enough guns, machine guns and ammo to blow away a couple of schools. he also has a history of mental illness. he has purchased these guns legally. THATS A PROBLEM.

How do we make it tougher for someone like him to buy machine guns???? I dont think the conversation should be about taking anyones guns away, unless they have a history of mentall illness, but how can we be more through in things like background checks and psychological testing? I realize that wont stop crazies from getting guns form non crazy gun owners, but we have to have a conversation about making things just a little bit harder or something...something has to change..

__________________
Women want someone who can make them laugh and protect them. So basically a Clown Ninja.

I dont own a gun, but if I wanted to or needed to, Id like to be able, but I dont need a AK-47.

I work with a guy who has enough guns, machine guns and ammo to blow away a couple of schools. he also has a history of mental illness. he has purchased these guns legally. THATS A PROBLEM.

How do we make it tougher for someone like him to buy machine guns????

You can't really take your opinion of "Need", and apply it to the American populace though. If that were the case, we'd all be driving little Geo Metros with 20hp engines. Because nobody "Needs" a giant SUV. Those are dangerous.

And your friend doesn't have a "Machine gun". I can pretty much guarantee that. Those have been illegal since 1934. There are some exceptions to that rule, but unless he's a billionaire gun dealer, I can assure you he doesn't have a machine gun. You're likely confusing "Machine gun" with "Semi-automatic rifle".

A Gun Control Law That Would Actually Work
By Robert Wright
Dec 17 2012, 10:03 AM ET Comment

The AR-15 is getting its fifteen minutes of fame. Whole articles in major newspapers are devoted to the rifle that Adam Lanza used in the Newtown shooting, as the nation begins to debate restoring the ban on "assault weapons."

But the assault weapons issue is a red herring.

First of all, there's no clear and simple definition of an assault weapon, and this fact has in the past led to incoherent regulation. The defunct 1994 assault weapons ban, according to the Wall Street Journal, outlawed "semiautomatic rifles that accepted detachable magazines and possessed at least two other characteristics, including a protruding pistol grip, flash suppressor or threaded barrel or a folding or telescoping stock." Um, how important was it whether the gun Lanza used had a "flash suppressor"? And, by sacrificing that and a few other such features ("protruding pistol grip," etc.), a mass killer gets to keep his detachable magazine, for rapid reloading?

Second, focusing on assault weapons--or even rifles in general--distracts from the important issue of magazine capacity in pistols. It's true that if you had taken away Lanza's AR-15, he wouldn't have had a rifle that could fire 30 rounds without reloading. However, he was also carrying two pistols--a Glock 20 and a Sig Sauer P226--each of which can fire 15 rounds without reloading. And, actually, since two pistols are less conspicuous than a rifle, they're a more effective way to get 30 rounds of continuous fire into lots of public settings.

Imagine the following world, which it's within our power to create: It's illegal to sell or possess a firearm--rifle or pistol--that can hold more than six bullets. And it's illegal to sell or possess a firearm with a detachable magazine. In other words, once a shooter exhausted the six rounds, he couldn't just snap in another six-round magazine; he'd have to put six more bullets in the gun one by one.

In this world, a significant number of those 20 Newtown first graders would almost certainly be alive. Lanza reportedly fired six bullets from his AR-15 just to get inside the locked school. So, in the alternative universe I just described, he would then have to more or less exhaust one of his two pistols to kill the principal and school psychologist he encountered after entering. At that point, as he headed for the classrooms, he'd have six more rapid-fire bullets left, after which he'd have to reload his guns bullet by bullet.

Is there a single legitimate use of firearms that requires more than six rounds of continuous fire? Certainly not hunting. And not any sort of self-defense that's realistically imaginable, unless you've recently antagonized a Mexican drug cartel.

As the gun lobby gears up to battle proposals such as this one, you'll hear a lot about the fact that mass killings are actually a drop in the bucket of total homicides. True. But mass killings take a disproportionate toll on the nation psychologically and spiritually. Thirty individual people dying in isolated assaults in various cities is a horrible thing, but it doesn't terrify our children, and it doesn't turn our schools into bunkers.

The sort of law I'm describing would make lots of current guns illegal. (I actually own one.) So you'd have to phase the law in over a couple of years, and, to overcome political resistance, you might have to compensate gun owners for surrendering newly illegal guns--or for having them altered to comply with the law. And, even then, the resistance would be very, very strong. It might even turn out to be insurmountable. But if the question is "What could we do that would greatly reduce the scale of mass killings while preserving the right of Americans to use firearms for legitimate purposes," this, it seems to me, is a real answer.

Update, 12/17 4:25 p.m.: More than one commenter has noted that most handguns currently manufactured would be illegal under my proposal. True. (As I noted in the final paragraph, I own such a gun.) And on Twitter, @drgitlin has noted something I didn't realize: A revolver, which would be clearly legal under my proposal, can be loaded fairly quickly with a "speedloader." Well, if speedloaders are indeed so speedy that they're the functional equivalent of detachable magazines, they could be banned. And as for the fact that most or all non-revolver pistols would be illegal under my proposal: You'd be surprised how fast gun manufacturers would fill this void by designing semi-automatics that could hold a maximum of six bullets and could only be loaded one bullet at a time. I'm not saying this makes my proposal politically feasible; the number of existing owners of conventional semi-automatic pistols (i.e. semi-automatics with detachable magazines) might create insurmountable resistance to it, as I noted in the final paragraph. Still, governments do have the power to ban things that exist, and in this case creating substitutes that complied with the new law would be very doable. And, even if banning detachable magazines in pistols does prove politically infeasible, that doesn't mean we can't make real progress by doing the politically easier thing of banning all magazines, for both rifles and handguns, that hold more than six bullets. And it's a trivial matter for manufacturers to create magazines that would fit existing guns and comply with that law. In any event, we shouldn't be fooled into thinking that another ban on "assault weapons" is by itself significant progress.

I love how the response to this post is nothing but slander towards "moonbat liberrals who want to ban all guns"

We arent going to geT anywhere in a dire situation where we desperately need to get somewhere with if we keep insulting the other side. I dont tihnk anyone wants to see what happened in CT happen again. I think most Americans would liek to come to some solution to do everything we can to protect ourselves and our children. WE ARENT GOING TO GET THAT DONE BY TROWING INSULTS AND FALSITIES AT EACH OTHER.

the above quote is basically about having meaningful conversations about what to do next. How do we protect ourselves as well as the 2nd ammendent? Without disarming citizens and without arming children when they go to school?

I dont own a gun, but if I wanted to or needed to, Id like to be able, but I dont need a AK-47.

I work with a guy who has enough guns, machine guns and ammo to blow away a couple of schools. he also has a history of mental illness. he has purchased these guns legally. THATS A PROBLEM.

How do we make it tougher for someone like him to buy machine guns???? I dont think the conversation should be about taking anyones guns away, unless they have a history of mentall illness, but how can we be more through in things like background checks and psychological testing? I realize that wont stop crazies from getting guns form non crazy gun owners, but we have to have a conversation about making things just a little bit harder or something...something has to change..

Machine guns are already illegal to have in this country. So unless your co worker has a special and difficut to get permit with the ATF then he can't have fully automatic weapons.